In this passage of Mad Shadows, Blais highlights Louise’s transition from being a perfect doll to being a damaged one because of her desire to satisfy only her physical appetite. Louise begins to realize that she is losing the beauty which she worships and the vessel of sexual pleasure who satisfies her body. Using vivid language to describe Louise’s growing internal tension, the narrator makes it evident that Louise’s physical satisfaction is short-lived. This tension also foreshadows her inevitable downfall at the end of the novel, where she loses her life, her mirrors and each of her material possessions. Firstly, within this passage, Louise’s internal tension grows as she notices her physical deterioration. The narrator seems to become mindfully …show more content…
They say, “The blemish on her cheek was like a welt on a leper, a sinister patch which threatened to destroy her. She covered it with cream but the cream turned purple.” In describing Louise with so much disgust, the narrator makes it evident that they feel an undying hatred towards her. Before this point, Louise’s exterior appears to be flawless, with skin covered in layers of makeup to conceal her imperfections, and the world around her is intimidated by the beauty of her and Patrice. However, nothing, not even cream, can hide these flaws anymore. The narrator describes Louise’s blemish as a disgusting monster – something so real and alive that she must do everything in her power to destroy it before it destroys her. The simile, “[…] like a welt on a leper,” is extremely powerful because for centuries, lepers have been dehumanized because their characteristic conditions are disgusting to most people. For the narrator to describe the singular blemish on Louise’s face as something so monstrous expresses how ugly it truly is. The feeling of insecurity inspired by her blemish is alien to Louise; she has never felt it nor has she ever
This is shown through the tone changing from being disappointed and critical to acceptance and appreciative. The speaker’s friend, who after listening to the speaker’s complaints, says that it seems like she was “a child who had been wanted” (line 12). This statement resonates with the speaker and slowly begins to change her thinking. This is apparent from the following line where the speaker states that “I took the wine against my lips as if my mouth were moving along that valved wall in my mother's body” (line 13 to line 15). The speaker is imagining her mother’s experience while creating her and giving birth to her. In the next several lines the speakers describe what she sees. She expresses that she can see her mother as “she was bearing down, and then breathing from the mask, and then bearing down, pressing me out into the world” (line 15 to line 18). The speaker can finally understand that to her mother the world and life she currently lived weren't enough for her. The imagery in the final lines of this poem list all the things that weren’t enough for the mother. They express that “the moon, the sun, Orion cartwheeling across the dark, not the earth, the sea” (line 19 to 21) none of those things matter to the mother. The only thing that matter was giving birth and having her child. Only then will she be satisfied with her life and
Blanche’s immoral and illogical decisions all stem from her husband's suicide. When a tragedy happens in someone’s life, it shows the person’s true colors. Blanche’s true self was an alcoholic and sex addict, which is displayed when “She rushes about frantically, hiding the bottle in a closet, crouching at the mirror and dabbing her face with cologne and powder” (Williams 122). Although Blanche is an alcoholic, she tries to hide it from others. She is aware of her true self and tries to hide it within illusions. Blanche pretends to be proper and young with her fancy clothes and makeup but is only masking her true, broken self.
In the passage from the novel LUCY, author Jamaica Kincaid dramatizes the forces of self and environment, through her character whose identity is challenged with a move. The new home provided all she needed, but it was all so many changes, she “didn’t want to take in anything else” (15-16). Her old “familiar and predictable past”(40) stayed behind her, and she now had to find who she was in her new life. Kincaid uses detail, metaphor, and tone in the passage to show her character’s internal struggle.
Sexton connects her misfortunes in life to the memories of her childhood and she awakens herself from the dream she has fabricated over time to the truth of her reality. As the poem progresses from the line mentioned above, Sexton becomes more frantic and distraught.
Consequently, she became paranoid and started to grow very hostile in her own thoughts. She does not directly express her hostile and negative feelings to the others. One of Eleanor’s dark thoughts was how “[She] would like to watch her dying,” referring to Theodora, as she smiled back to her saying “Don’t be silly.” Eleanor constantly battled herself mentally and what she portrayed as reality. She was constantly questioning herself and how she might look. “Is she laughing at me? Eleanor wondered; has she decided that I am not fit to stay?” A self-doubt thought, that Eleanor had when Theodora was painting her toenails. “Why me, she wondered, why me? Am I the public conscience? Expected always to say in cold words, what the rest of them are too arrogant to recognize? Am I supposed to be the weakest, weaker than Theodora? (86,103,117). The feelings and thoughts that Eleanor experiences are not that of a rational adult, rather, they stemmed from an unhealthy state of
Throughout her transformation, she does not only lose her unwanted body parts but also herself. She was “born as usual.” She was “healthy.” She was “intelligent.” Yet, she “offered” her body and became an object for others to point and critique at. Upon the judgments that are harshly thrown at the poor child, “her good nature [was] worn out/like a fan belt.” The poet creates this simile and the tone of insecurity to show that over a long period of time she is no longer able to take in any more criticism. She cannot be “apologizing” any more for how she is. Thus, she conforms to the ways of society by having pieces of her cut off. She becomes a doll, an object that does not live life and that is easily wielded and manipulated by others. This child takes her own freedom away, a freedom that Louise from Chopin’s work strives
In contrast, syntax provides a new perspective to the narrator s behavior as sentence structure draws attention to her erratic behavior. By her last entry, the narrator s sentences have become short and simple. Paragraphs 227 through 238 contain few adjectives resulting in limited descriptions yet her short sentences emphasize her actions providing plenty of imagery. The syntax quickly pulls the reader through the end as the narrator reaches an end to her madness.
Louise Gluck’s, “Gretel in darkness” is a haunting poem about the horrors the speaker, Gretel, faces and tries so hard to forget. The poem takes place after the witch’s death and Gretel has saved her brother and herself from her torment. Everything should be fine, Gretel says, “This is the world we wanted. All who would have seen us dead are dead.” This is suggestive of a dream that is achieved and portraying a character that is full of urgency, bitterness and violence. This contradicts with the title, “in darkness”, giving it an ironic tone. Although she feels regret for this unimaginable act, she originally did it for her brother. On the other hand it also seems Gretel is unsatisfied since she feels all this guilt and is haunted by the death of the witch, the witch Gretel killed. “I hear the witch’s cry,” Gretel states.
The poem's speaker mistreated,gloomy and being isolated. She is a person who loss and assimilation if not loose your self. “That this
complication, In adapting to a new land. Julia create her poem in a outwardly form to point out
King, in introducing the little convent girl to the reader, goes to great lengths to present her as a dreary and uninteresting creature. She wore dark clothing, sat rigidly upright, secluded herself in her room, and displayed little zest for life. Therefor, when King uses the work "blac...
Louise’s fate was tragic. But still I think that it’s better to live an hour of freedom and happiness than to spend an entire lifetime in the shadow of the “gray cloud”. Louise experienced real freedom that meant the absence of her husband’s domination. The irony of life killed her too early, but it seems to me that there is no need to feel pity for her. Even if it was a short hour, it was the time when all her dreams came true. She found the freedom from her husband that her lonely soul was searching for, and just for this we can consider her as a really happy woman.
” When her Little One is forced away from her, her desolation is clear when it eats her away “she appeared, listless, wan, and hollow-eyed (175).’ This description shows the darkness that engulfs Lae Choo at the absence of her Little One. This is a contrast between the moments when Lae Choo can hold her Little One in her arms where she is “electrified” with “color flushed to her cheeks.”
Louise has turned into a little girl that must depend on man to take care of her. Louise pleads with Brently to go to the gardens of Paris. She begs like a child begging for something that is impossible to give. Brently must lock her up in their home to protect her from her curiosity and need to see the world. The filmmakers do not give her the commonsense to realize the dangers she would face in seeing Paris and all the other places she would like to visit. Louise remains the little girl in the flashbacks and Brently has replaced her dead father as the soul keeper of her world. Brently must protect her from the world and herself. She is made to be completely dependent on him from her everyday needs to being her only window into the outside world. There are no female positions of authority in her life. Aunt Joe is left in the background and Marjorie must ultimately answer to Brently. Louise is left to see men as the only authority in her life. She herself as a woman must feel powerless to the will of men. Brently even chooses the destinations of their daily visits to far off and exotic places. These excursions are Louise's only escape. Brently is made to be her captor and savior at the same time. Her fate is completely dependent in his yet she is given no control of either.
One theme in this story is forbidden freedom. The freedom represents Louise’s independence that she receives from hearing about the death of her husband. Louise is only able to dream of that independence for a little time since in the end her husband turned out to be alive. Another theme is the oppression of her marriage. Even though Louise describes her husband as loving and caring she still feels joy after hearing he is dead. The motif of this story is weeping which is something Louise either does or thinks about doing throughout the story. She even imagines herself weeping over Mr. Mallard’s dead body. The only time she is not weeping is when she is thinking of her new found freedom. An important and most used symbol throughout the story would be the open window. After hearing about her husband’s death she goes upstairs where she barricades herself in her room starring out the window. Louise gazes through this open window during most of the story. While looking out the open window she dreams of her endless freedom and the opportunities it